Marina Brown

An Avenue in Autumn and Photographs of California

helpless gods, we watch the Caldor
Fire ridging the Sierra Crest,
a writhing red fur
that gluts 97 runs and 30 lifts
of the Heavenly resort. 

the final day of August comes
consecrated, flurries of soot
in the waning light
riling into lightning-
leaded pyrocumulus. 

in photos taken from the cockpit
of an F-15, opaque white heads
curdle over masses of ash
like satisfied destroying angels
fattening our hilltops. 

the edges of the all-weather eagle’s
impenetrable glass
cast back the navy dusk and
rest of Nevada’s heavy distance. 

in the indistinguishable
morning of the first of
September, South Lake crouches
and flags. downed poplar-lines 

cross like split railways.
debris in the sarcoline sun
ambers and swirls
with plastic and splinters. 

in familial stands, black oaks
and big-cone pines firework open.
valley gardens spot with embers
that take root like strewn seeds 

as if we named them for this moment
of transformation – arnica,
aster, the blanketflower and torch lily,
larkspur, speedwell,
snow-in-summer,
mountain ash and sierra current.

on the soaked state border, suffocated
birds and dripping aspens blur
like melting coins too indifferent 

to fall. in another image, one
wide, flat house at the end of a lane
swallows its vertical frame, a draft
of sky between the dense old
willows like chimney smoke. 

a cloaked silhouette has left its door
and misshapen windows open.
shrugs away
as if moving through water. 

crosses a bridge made of dirt
and pressed shadow. the cut
of the blown path nearest
our eye is struck with
deeper hollows like thumbprints.

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Marina Brown is a poet, editor and translator. Born in Ukraine and raised in California, she holds two bachelor’s degrees in International Relations and Russian from UC Davis and an MFA in Poetry from SDSU. She is an Editorial Assistant for Poetry International and a recipient of the Graduate Equity Fellowship, Marsh-Rebelo Scholarship and Savvas Endowed Fellowship. Her book reviews have been published in Los Angeles Review and Poetry International.